In recent years, various areas of research have demanded cost-effective assays and reactions of diminishing scale, increasing efficiency and accuracy, with high-throughput capacity. Multi-well devices with multiple individual wells, such as multi-well plates or multi-well blocks, are some of the most commonly used tools to carry out such reactions and assays. A variety of multi-well arrangements, constructed according to standardized formats, are commercially available. For example, a multi-well device having ninety-six depressions or wells arranged in a 12×8 array is a commonly used arrangement.
For example, nucleic acid amplification and detection are among the most valuable techniques used in biological research today. Scientists in all areas of research rely on these methods for a wide range of applications. For some applications, qualitative nucleic acid detection is sufficient. Other applications, however, demand a quantitative analysis.
Presently, conventional polymerase chain reaction (“PCR”) detects the amplified product (commonly referred to as the “amplicon”) by an end-point analysis by running DNA on an agarose gel after the reaction has finished. In contrast, real-time PCR allows the accumulation of amplified product to be detected and measured as the reaction progresses, that is, in “real-time.” Realtime detection of PCR products is made possible by including in the reaction a fluorescent molecule that reports an increase in the amount of DNA with a proportional increase in fluorescent signal. The fluorescent chemistries employed for this purpose include DNA-binding dyes and fluorescently labeled sequence-specific primers or probes. Specialized thermal cyclers equipped with fluorescent detection modules are used to monitor the fluorescence as amplification occurs. The measured fluorescence reflects the amount of amplified product in each cycle.
The ability to accurately reproduce small amounts of reaction mixes for real-time PCR is crucial for the overall success of the experiment. Almost all real-time PCR reactions are done in well plates that fit into the actual PCR machine. Even though there are numerous manufactures of these machines that all use a similar 96 well platform having 96 wells configured in 8 rows of 12 wells.
To ensure that each well is receiving the correct addition of reaction mix, the pipetor must be extremely careful to add the correct amount of reaction mix and into the correct well. This process requires the pipetor's undivided concentration to ensure the wells are loaded properly. However, in the conventional well platforms, there is no indicator to show the pipetor his or her progress in loading the wells on the platform.
As such, a need currently exists for a PCR platform that has a visual indicator allowing the pipetor to track the loading progress of the platform that does not affect or interfere with the reaction progress.